Student Transportation Inc. Makes Highly Strategic Minority Investment in Rideshare Service Provider HopSkipDrive
November 21 2017 - 9:03AM
Student Transportation Inc. (STI) (TSX:STB) (NASDAQ:STB) today
announced that a subsidiary of the company’s Managed Services Group
(MSG) has closed on a strategic investment in the Los Angeles-based
company HopSkipDrive, the leading rideshare service for children.
HopSkipDrive provides customized transportation services to meet
the diverse needs of today’s school children and busy families.
HopSkipDrive knows the challenges of getting students to sports,
band practice, the doctor’s office, volunteer activities, and
school enhancement activities and has designed a ridesharing
service that revolutionizes the definition of student
transportation.
Thomas Kominsky, Chief Growth Officer of STI, who will lead the
company’s investment in HopSkipDrive, stated, “STI’s Managed
Services Group is excited to partner with such an innovative
disruptor like HopSkipDrive while assisting them in building new
markets through our established processes and go-to-market
strategies. HopSkipDrive is perfectly congruent with our MSG
strategy; a non-asset market leader that builds upon our core
competencies and pulls us into new markets and revenue channels.
Extending our expertise in safety, training, maintenance, and
driver recruitment will immediately create value by enhancing a lot
of what HopSkipDrive is already doing.”
HopSkipDrive is the safe and dependable ridesharing service that
helps parents get their kids where they need to go when they're not
able to do so themselves. Founded by three working moms who
understand the challenges busy families face, HopSkipDrive puts
parents in control with notifications at pickup and drop off,
personalized code words for pickups, monitored driver behavior, and
a live customer service team committed to getting kids to their
destination safely and on-time. Drivers, called ‘CareDrivers’, are
owner-operators of their vehicles, but are carefully vetted,
screened, trained and go through extensive background compliance
checks prior to providing service. HopSkipDrive’s technology
provides ease of use and the comforts of safety and security.
“HopSkipDrive is thrilled to partner with STI, a
company whose reputation for transporting K-12 students to and from
schools safely and dependably every day is bar none,” said Joanna
McFarland, CEO of HopSkipDrive. “We help get thousands of kids to
and from school and have partnered with hundreds of schools to
offer innovative rideshare and carpool solutions. STI transports
1.25 million children to and from school every day and their
investment and partnership is a great validation of not only our
service but also our commitment to safety.”
Kominsky continued, “HopSkipDrive fits perfectly into our
‘technology-forward’ services-based strategy of serving an
organization’s diverse transportation needs. We both take
significant pride in delivering high levels of customer service
while providing the safest, most reliable transportation. This
partnership is the proverbial win-win and we look forward to the
successful outcomes for the parents, kids and larger organizations
it will deliver.”
STI Chairman and CEO Denis Gallagher will join the Board of
Directors of HopSkipDrive, bringing over 40 years experience as a
leader and entrepreneur in the student transportation industry.
“I’m thrilled to work with Joanna and her team to develop this
business, and provide strategic oversight to help her grow and
expand the overall rideshare market for children,” stated Mr.
Gallagher, who is joined by Rick Heitzmann (FirstMark Capital),
Greg Bettinelli (Upfront Ventures) and Greg Steiner (eHarmony) on
HopSkipDrive’s Board of Directors. “This is a very unique situation
where a strategic player such as STI has now partnered with an
industry disruptor, HopSkipDrive, which is backed by some of the
most innovative technology-focused venture capital firms that have
successful track records of building new businesses. Together, we
are excited to create an improved industry model that meets the
standards parents and schools are seeking for safe, secure and
reliable transportation for their children.”
For more information on Student Transportation Inc. and its
family of companies, please visit www.RideSTBus.com
About Student Transportation
Inc.Founded in 1997, Student Transportation Inc. (STI) is
an industry leader in school transportation, safety and fleet
services. STI operates the youngest fleet in the business with more
than 13,500 vehicles, providing customers with the highest level of
safe and reliable student transportation, management, logistics and
technology solutions throughout the U.S. and Canada. STI’s services
are delivered by drivers, dispatchers, maintenance technicians,
terminal managers, information technology professionals and others
who are caring members of their local communities. For more
information, please visit www.RideSTBus.com.
Forward-Looking Statements
Certain statements in this news release are "forward-looking
statements" within the meaning of applicable securities laws, which
reflect the expectations of management regarding, among other
matters, STI's revenues, expense levels, cost of capital, financial
leverage, seasonality, liquidity, profitability of new businesses
acquired or secured through bids, borrowing availability, ability
to renew or refinance various loan facilities as they become due,
ability to execute STI's growth strategy and cash distributions, as
well as their future growth, results of operations, performance and
business prospects and opportunities. Forward-looking statements
generally can be identified by the use of forward-looking
terminology such as "may", "will", "expect", "intend", "estimate",
"anticipate", "believe", "should", "plans" or "continue" or similar
expressions, and the negative forms thereof, suggesting future
outcomes or events.
Company contact:Doug CoupeDirector of
Communications & Investor Relations (843)
884-2720dcoupe@ridesta.com